The Screen Actors Guild award nominations are important in the Oscar precursor game, but not in their most showcase way: the Best Ensemble winner (often taken to be SAG’s equivalent of “Best Picture,” since it awards a film’s entire cast) doesn’t have any remarkable correlation to the Oscar winner for Best Picture. However, in the acting categories themselves, SAG nominations are very important, since under Academy rules, actors nominate actors, and thus there’s a significant overlap between the people casting ballots in those categories at SAG and for the Oscars. And in terms of the awards themselves, actors form the single largest voting bloc of Academy members.
The full list of nominees is here, and a few thoughts on SAG’s choices–and omissions–follow:
BEST ENSEMBLE:
ARGO
THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL
LES MISERABLES
LINCOLN
SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
The most surprising exclusion here would have been Zero Dark Thirty, but reportedly screeners only went out to a portion of SAG’s voters in the last few days, and since the film isn’t in theaters yet, that severely limited its ability to be seen. Django Unchained also hasn’t sent out screeners–and, while filled with tremendous performances, may be too stylized and violent to be an award winner in any case. Best Exotic seems to have gotten the “indie” slot that could have gone to The Master, Moonrise Kingdom or Anna Karenina. (It should be noted that Beasts of the Southern Wild, which wasn’t produced under a SAG agreement, wasn’t eligible for any awards.)
BEST ACTOR
Bradley Cooper, SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
Daniel Day-Lewis, LINCOLN
John Hawkes, THE SESSIONS
Hugh Jackman, LES MISERABLES
Denzel Washington, FLIGHT
The big surprise here is the exclusion of Joaquin Phoenix for The Master, a film that clearly didn’t appeal to SAG voters. (His anti-awards interview a few weeks ago may not have helped either.) Other possibilities that didn’t make it included Jake Gyllenhaal for End of Watch and Jack Black for Bernie.
BEST ACTRESS
Jessica Chastain, ZERO DARK THIRTY
Marion Cotillard, RUST AND BONE
Jennifer Lawrence, SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
Helen Mirren, HITCHCOCK
Naomi Watts, THE IMPOSSIBLE
Chastain, Cotillard and Lawrence were the sure things here. The Mirren and Watts slots could have gone to Emmanuelle Riva for Amour, or Keira Knightley for Anna Karenina.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Alan Arkin, ARGO
Javier Bardem, SKYFALL
Robert DeNiro, SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
Philip Seymour Hoffman, THE MASTER
Tommy Lee Jones, LINCOLN
Bardem’s nomination is a major surprise, coming at the expense, most notably, of Matthew McConaughey for Magic Mike.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Sally Field, LINCOLN
Anne Hathaway, LES MISERABLES
Helen Hunt, THE SESSIONS
Nicole Kidman, THE PAPERBOY
Maggie Smith, THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL
Kidman’s inclusion, for her brilliant, crazy work in the almost unseen Paperboy, is the shock of the day, rivaled only by the exclusion of Amy Adams, who was spectacular in The Master. Given the nomination for Bardem, one might have thought Judi Dench had a chance for Skyfall, but Dench may have canceled herself out with her other very fine performance in Best Exotic.
SAG also gives out an array of television awards, which are less important in the bigger picture, given that the Emmys are months away. The group’s nominations were mostly in line with last fall’s Emmys, aside from a complete lack of interest in Girls.
The SAG Awards will be presented on January 27, during the thick of the Oscar campaigns.
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